


not a love letter

by mistyheartrbs



Category: Little Witch Academia
Genre: Birds, F/F, Letters, Mutual Pining, POV Alternating, alcor should not have had as big of a part in this story as he did
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-20
Updated: 2017-08-20
Packaged: 2018-12-17 18:48:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11857497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mistyheartrbs/pseuds/mistyheartrbs
Summary: Letters are passed back and forth, and with them, realizations are made.





	not a love letter

**Author's Note:**

> this was meant to just be a cute short thing and then it ended up being 7k words. i loved writing it though - the lwa universe is so much fun to play around with, there're so many possibilities.

_Dear Croix,_

_Is Alcor delivering these letters to you? I don't think he likes you very much, so he might have just ripped them up or something. I've tried to tell him that you're not going to do anything, but you know how stubborn that old bird is. Anyway, I hope they're finding you, wherever you are. I hope you're doing alright._

_All the best, Chariot du Nord_

Chariot released a heavy sigh as she finished the letter, rolling it up and tying it to Alcor's leg with a ribbon. 

"Find Croix, okay?" she whispered to him. Alcor gave a rather rude-sounding squawk in response before flapping out the window. 

"Urs- Chariot-sensei?" Akko poked her head through the door, slowly stepping inside. "Is now a bad time? I can come back later, it's just that Sucy's latest potion made the whole dorm smell like feet and Diana's busy with something in the library so I figured I'd come over here for a little while." 

"Until the feet thing is sorted out?" 

"Yeah." Akko scratched the back of her head. "She was gonna test it out on _me,_ but Lotte stopped her just in time, hehe." Chariot blinked, taking off her glasses for a moment before putting them back on. 

"You can stay here for however long you want, Akko." 

"Where's your bird?" Akko put a hand to her forehead like an old-timey explorer, as if Alcor would suddenly pop out from the distance. 

"I sent him off with some . . . mail." 

"Ooh, was it important teacher business? Or was it a secret?" 

"It was a letter to Croix." 

"She went off to find a cure for the poison, didn't she?" Akko cast a less-than-subtle glance at Chariot's broom, which lay, gathering dust and cobwebbed, in the corner. "That's pretty brave." 

"It is." 

"What were you two, if you don't mind me asking?" Akko hopped up on a chair, her feet swinging back and forth, and a sad smile began to make its way across Chariot's face. "I mean, you were friends! I saw some old photos in the yearbooks - it's funny that they keep those around, there're so many - but what else?" 

"We had a falling out over the Shiny Rod, and we drifted apart, as friends do." Akko's fingers twitched in her lap, as if feeling for a staff that wasn't there anymore. "Before that, though? I guess we were just two teenagers acting giddy on the highs of love, or whatever you want to call it." Chariot breathed in deeply, closing her eyes. "We'd always sneak around the campus, kissing between classes and the like. I was in the year below her, so we weren't even remotely close to each other in the dorms, but that didn't stop me!" 

"You snuck out?!" Akko yelped. 

"Sometimes, on nights when the moon was full and we'd both had long days. I'd grab my broom, stuff my bed full of pillows, and hop out the window to fly across campus and see her. We'd just stand out in the gardens and talk about the future, sometimes, or I'd show her my latest idea for a performance, or we'd just do nothing and watch the stars. I liked those ones the best." 

"That sounds nice." 

"It was." Chariot wiped the edge of her eye. "That was a long time ago, though. People change. We changed. Now, all I can really do is send these and hope that they make it through to her." 

***

Miles and miles away, Croix Meridies sat alone in a secluded little cabin by a river. Pages and pages of research, plants and berries and things she'd rather not refer to by name stuffed into jars, and crude inventions made from scrap metal crowded around her, and still she scribbled down notes until her hands cramped. 

"Just a few more pages," she muttered to herself, shaking out her wrist. "Just a few more pages, and then I'll turn in for the night." 

_"Ca-caw! Ca-" Fwip!_

She was about to do just that when an unpleasant smacking sound rang in her ears, and she flung open her window to see Chariot's bird lying on the ground, his leg comically extended upwards with something tied to it. Croix took it carefully, as if it might explode, then patted the bird on the head and slammed the window shut. 

"I told her I'd be fine, I'm traveling - how'd that thing even _find_ me?" The moon shone outside, still marked with that same imprint as always, and Croix ran a finger across the words. Chariot's writing was the same as it had been years ago, she realized with a chuckle - a little bit messy, with loops in places they didn't need to be. Turning to the empty pages beside her, she took a deep breath. 

"No," she said to the room. "I'm not going to- she's not going to read it. I don't have any reason to do this. No reason at all." 

She wrote until ink bled on her fingers. 

***

_Dear Chariot,_

_My research has been going fairly well. I've started to experiment with the cure, though it seems like it might be a long time before I can return to you with anything concrete. This is the third in my temporary homes to gather information and potential ingredients, and I'll most likely be moving again soon. The machine you've received this with is a prototype of mine, so it may not work as planned. I hope that your crow managed to get home safely. I hope that things are running smoothly at Luna Nova, despite everything I've done. Please send your protégé my regards._

_-Croix Meridies_

The heap of metal and magic on her desk whirred excitedly as she tied the letter to its hull. A poor replica of her old vacuums, made with any junk she'd been able to scrounge up, Croix figured it would do her well enough to send a letter a few countries over. 

"It's a test," she said to the delivery robot as she slid open the window. "I'm ensuring that there'll be a way to send the cure when it's finished. That's all." The robot gave a _chirrup_ in response. "Don't sass me. Take this to Luna Nova, alright? As fast as you can." 

The robot sailed out the window, coasting on the wind, and Croix watched it leave until it might as well have been another bird, just a dark spot under the fluffy white clouds. 

***

"Akko told me that you tried to use her as a guinea pig for the potion that ended up nearly poisoning your entire dorm, is that right?" Chariot sat on the back of a chair, looking one Sucy Manbavaran dead in the eye. Sucy dismissed her with a flippant gray hand. 

"Eh, she's practically invincible. I wouldn't do it if I thought she was in any real danger." 

"One of your classmates popped into the room and passed out." 

"That wasn't Akko, though." Chariot sighed as she took off her glasses, pinching the bridge of her nose. 

_When did I become this protective?_ "I'll let you off with a warning," she finally sighed. "Just . . . don't do this sort of thing again, okay?" 

"Thanks," Sucy deadpanned. Chariot wondered if she'd heard the second part of what she'd said at all. "I'm gonna-" 

Whatever Sucy was about to say was interrupted by the sound of mechanical screeching and shattering glass as a slightly pointed lump crashed through the window. Chariot instinctively dived down, grabbing Sucy and only looking up when the noise stopped. 

"It's not killing us, Professor," Sucy grunted. "You can let go of me now." 

"Sorry, Sucy." Chariot slowly climbed to her feet and stared at the now-smoking machine. A roll of paper poked out, orange flames just starting to lick at it. Chariot snatched the paper and blew out the fire, unrolling it slowly. 

"Is it someone's expulsion notice?" 

"It's a letter." Chariot trembled, just slightly, and Sucy stared at her with a quizzical expression plain on her face. "It's a letter from Croix." 

"Didn't she try to kill us?" 

"You should really get back to your classes, Sucy." Chariot waved politely until Sucy's hunched figure was completely gone. The letter itself, singed and wrinkled and curling at the bottom from having flown on the robot for at least a few days, was written with what seemed to be the utmost care. Croix's neat, blocky words stared back up at her, and Chariot knew without a shadow of a doubt what she had to do next. 

***

_Dear Croix,_

_I got your letter - it was nice to hear from you again._

_I'll have to preface this by asking you to please send any reply in the form of something less dangerous - your contraption nearly killed one of my students, and it won't budge from my room however much I try to pull it out. Did you enchant it? You always were great with tricky spells like that, not so great with undoing them when they went too far. Remember that time we tried to get our brooms to catch us when we fell, except then they'd slide under us every time we got into our beds or did anything involving jumping? We had to explain the whole thing to Professor Nelson, and she made us scrub the walls for a week!_

_Anyway, things are going well! Traveling sounds like it'd be lovely, I miss that. Maybe you could send a postcard next time?_

_Best, Chariot_

"Any luck with it, Constanze?" Chariot called behind her. Constanze shook her head. Chariot was starting to suspect that the remains of the delivery robot was going to become a permanent staple of her office. "Okay, Alcor, do you think you can find her?" The crow gave a reluctant _"caw"_ of agreement as he extended a leg for Chariot to tie the letter to. "You're the best." The window opened, and Alcor flew away, as graceful as he'd been in the height of the Shiny Chariot days. 

***

"You don't mind a bit of noise, do you? See, I'm a bit of an . . . entrepreneur, and so I might end up being loud." 

"You've booked a reservation with us for three weeks, Ms. Meridies," the man at the receptionist's desk said, his finger rolling down the computer screen until he found what was (presumably) Croix's reservation. "That's longer than anyone's ever booked a reservation with us, considering how we're a roadside motel, and a bloody poor one at that." A mouse skittered across the floor as if to prove his point. "You could bring a whole rock band in here and I wouldn't care." 

_"Ca-caw! Ca-caw!"_ Alcor sailed in through the door, a roll of parchment held in his talons. The receptionist raised both his eyebrows.

"We _don't_ allow pets, though." 

"Oh, he's not mine." Alcor landed on Croix's shoulder, pecking insistently at her cheek. "He's . . . a friend's. We're witches." 

"I figured." 

"In fact, I wouldn't even call him anyone's pet, more of a familiar - you know, like an assist-" 

"Just get the bird out of here." Croix rolled her eyes as she dragged her luggage behind her, prying the letter from Alcor's talons before shooing him off. 

***

Once she'd gotten herself set up in the room - far more cramped than the cabin, she realized with a groan, and far draftier - Croix took to reading the letter. 

"Is this going to be our _thing_ now?" she sighed to herself. "Letters? What are we, some B-list romance movie?" Regardless, she clicked a pen and started to write. 

_Dear Chariot,_

_I'll find a better way to send you these. I don't have anything to say about the delivery robot - all I did was tell it to go to Luna Nova. It shouldn't have crashed, or stayed there like it did, but then again it_ was _a prototype. You can't expect things to work out perfectly each time._

_I remember the brooms. God, they wouldn't leave us alone. It was like living at home again!_

Croix laughed lightly at the memory, cupping her own cheek. 

_I've found the next place for me to work on my research. It's nothing notable, just a crappy roadside motel somewhere in the north of France, but I've heard about a few rare plants that grow here, and an old hermit who's said to have a sprawling underground library a few miles down the road. They're probably just rumors, but it's worth a try. The only problem's the weather, this place doesn't have any heating. The poncho isn't doing wonders as a means of protection._

_That aside, I hope that the delivery robot isn't giving you too much trouble, and say hello to the goblins for me. I liked them._

_-Croix Meridies_

_P.S. I stole a postcard from the front desk. It's probably forty years old and the trees in it probably died before we were born, but it's pretty._

She must've looked to be quite a sight, a magic woman in a poncho dropping an envelope in some rusty and nearly-unused mailbox, but she didn't care much for appearances and there was hardly anyone around, and so Croix stood there for longer than she had to. The sky was a gentle shade of blue, the clouds still floated by, and the world spun. Her breaths eased, and she left the mailbox behind without a word. 

***

Chariot wasn't sure what she was expecting after being told she had mail - lack of postage and having disappeared for ten years generally went together, but she saw the lettering and scratched-out return address and knew instantly. 

"You could make a pretty nice chair outta this," Amanda commented as Chariot walked in, slumped over the delivery robot's ruins like it was a loungeseat. "If you draped a blanket or somethin' over it, at least." 

"How did you get in here?" 

"Your door was open," Jasminka chirped, leaning on a bookcase and munching on a bowl of sweets. "We thought it'd be nice to wait until you came back." 

"Uh, thank . . . you?" Chariot had no idea what she was supposed to do, and so she turned back to the letter, which had remained unopened. She read it with soft laughter and warm smiles at parts until she'd reached the end. 

"Who was it from?" Jasminka asked. 

"I've got a few hours to kill if you wanna use me for errands to pick up a cover for this thing, whatever it is," Amanda said. An idea slowly came to mind, something so cheesy that the _Night Fall_ books would've called it overblown, but Chariot had made up her mind nonetheless. 

"Do either of you know how to knit?" 

***

"Professor Calli- du Nord? Which one is it, now?"

"Either one's fine, Diana." Chariot regarded the girl sitting next to her with a sort of nostalgia - there was familiarity in the way she held herself so tensely, like she might break otherwise, like she was afraid of moving. "Do you want some tea?" 

"I- no. That's quite alright." Diana breathed, long and steady, before she continued. "You called me here . . . so that I would teach you how to knit? You, a teacher?" 

"I never learned how, haha." Chariot scratched the back of her neck with a nervous laugh. "You know, becoming a performer right out of high school, disappearing after that, it doesn't give you much time to find a hobby." 

_"Right."_ Diana raised her knitting needles cautiously, as if readying herself for combat. "So, you start here, and . . ." 

***

Hours passed, and soon Chariot had something vaguely - _very_ vaguely - resembling a scarf in her hands. 

"I suppose I'll be taking my leave, then," Diana said, standing up with her back straight and her gaze turned to the door. 

"Thank you for your help," Chariot managed to blurt out before Diana rested her hand on the ornate doorknob. "We should, ah, we should do this again sometime. Maybe you could bring Akko with you next time around." Diana's cheeks flushed a bright pink that made Chariot laugh just a little.

"I d-don't know what you're insinuating, Professor du Nord-Callistis-et cetera, b-but I can assure you that there is _nothing_ going on between myself and Atsuko Kagari!" she sputtered indignantly. Chariot took a sip of her cold tea. 

"I never said there was," she replied evenly. "If you ever want to talk about it, though, my door's always open!" Diana stormed out in a huff. 

_Dear Croix,_

_To be young, and in love, and teaching your professor how to knit. I think you'd have liked Diana a lot if you'd stayed longer. Anyway, enough about me._

_Snail mail? I shouldn't be surprised, but I am. It's probably for the best - we still can't get that delivery robot out of the room. I was expecting something a little bit more dramatic, though. Thank you for the postcard - it's sitting on my desk now. I framed it, mostly because Alcor tried to eat it and it's harder to eat a glass frame than it is a piece of paper. He's a naughty bird, but he's getting these letters to you, so that counts for something._

_Anyway again - I keep getting sidetracked, don't I? - be careful around that hermit. She might try to trick you, or keep you trapped in her underground library, or something like that. I'd tread with caution._

_The mess of wool you're probably looking at in confusion right now is my first - and probably only - attempt at a scarf. It might keep you a little bit warmer. I hope it helps. I hope you're not feeling too lonely._

_Lov-_

Chariot stopped the quill almost immediately, leaving a blotted line of ink in her wake as she looked over what she'd read.

"Oh, no." It was late, and her room was lit only by one lantern, and she held her head in her hands as she hastily scratched out the three letters. 

_Best, Chariot_

***

"Knock three times, whisper your deepest wish, and you will find what you seek." Croix stared at the wood-carved sign, worn by years of weather, in disbelief. "What is this, the Middle Ages?

_"Ca-caw! Ca-caw!"_ Alcor dove down from the sky like a missile, a cardboard box held tightly in his talons, and he skidded right next to her. 

"I'll give you an eight out of ten for the landing," Croix deadpanned, gently tugging the package from the crow. "Thank you." Alcor gave her a curt nod, blinked his beady eyes, and flew away. 

_"Caw."_

"Tell Chariot you deserve extra birdseed for finding me out here!" she called out, but the bird was already nothing more than a gray speck under the gray clouds. "My deepest wish, huh?" Skepticism overwhelmed her, but still Croix knocked three times on the oak door in the gnarled tree - an honest-to-god _tree,_ whoever this woman was, she had no sense of subtlety - took a breath, and began. "I wish for . . . for . . ." Flipping open the package, wrapping the scarf around her neck without a second thought, her chest tightened the further she read. "I wish for-" 

"Hah, you were really about to do that?" The door swung open, revealing a jaunty old woman with a stooped back and eyes that looked like gears. "Nobody's looked at the sign in years! Honey, honey, you've gotta see this." Another old woman - this one with a walker and more wrinkles, moving slower - crept over. 

"Really? What'd you wish for?" 

"I thought you were a hermit," Croix said blankly to the first old woman. "Don't hermits live alone?" 

"Eh, can't stay cooped up in this tree without the wife, now can I?" 

"Never could get rid of me!" the second old woman proudly proclaimed before breaking out into a coughing fit. "Come on - _khik_ \- inside, we've got croquettes on the stove." 

"Alright." Croix drew her wand underneath her poncho, just in case, but the women looked harmless enough. The interior was homely, if disorganized - patchwork couches stuffed next to mechanical scooters, what looked like a sword hanging on the wall, school uniforms repurposed as blankets - it could really only be described as _eccentric._

"Sit down anywhere you'd like," the first old woman croaked, humming to herself as she picked up the steaming hot dish with her bare hands. She reminded Croix of Amanda, in a way. "We don't get visitors too often, do we, darling?" 

"I think the last one was . . . hmm, three years ago?" The second old woman held a bony finger to her chin as she talked. Despite her age - she must've been a hundred, while her wife walked around like she was hardly seventy - there was something youthful in her gaze, a sort of childlike wonder that time hadn't been able to grasp. "Three years ago, right?" 

"Sounds right to me!" the first old woman called back, now carrying the plate. "Here, take one. They're fresh out of the oven." 

"Oh, erm, thank you." Croix cautiously took one, taking the smallest bite and preparing to call poison control if anything was out of the order. 

It was delicious. 

"Liking it?" the first old woman asked. Croix nodded.

"What are these?" she mumbled around a mouthful. The second old woman started to raise her hands over her head, but her wife put a hand on her shoulder. 

"It's a family recipe," she answered, clasping her thin hands together wistfully. "My mother used to make these every night. I'm keeping the tradition alive, at least until the two of us go." 

"Right." The three of them sat like that for a while, eating and making small talk, until the plate was empty and the first old woman stood up. 

"Okay, so what really brings you here? I can't imagine you've come all this way just to chat up some old broads." Croix took a deep breath. 

"I'm looking for the cure to Wagandea's Curse." Both old women blinked. 

"The what now?" the second old woman asked. "Is it a witch thing?" 

"Yes?" Croix's eyebrows furrowed. "I thought _you two_ were witches?" 

"What? No, no, we're not witches." The first old woman laughed a raspy, hearty laugh. "Ah, no, this one's all human-" she pointed to her wife "-and I'm . . . well, I'm not a witch." 

"What about the giant library?" 

"Hobby. It's fun to hear the rumors, and it keeps us occupied in our old age." 

"You're meaning to tell me that you don't have any information on it at all?" 

"Oh, I never said that." The first old woman started for a low door in the back of the room. "Follow me." Croix had no choice but to do as she said. "Hey, what's the combination again?" 

"Twenty one, one, zero thirteen!" the second old woman yelled out. 

"Right, right, of course! Got it!" The lock clicked, and the door opened to reveal what could only be described as a grand, beautiful underground chamber. "My older sister started this place. She never got around to finishing it - always acted like she never had enough time to finish anything, never felt like she did enough. I hope she realized that she did way more than she needed to." The first old woman held a hand to her chest. 

"You miss her?" 

"Every day." The first old woman wiped her eye and started down the stairs. "Enough about me, though. You said something about the . . . Wagandea Sickness?" 

"Yes." It really was astonishing - a long, long flight of steps leading down to towering bookshelves that sprawled to the ceiling. There must have been thousands - millions, maybe - of books contained there. "A . . . friend of mine was affected by it. It's so rare that nobody's looking into it, but that's my goal." 

"Noble," the first old woman - the only old woman, now, considering that her wife was still upstairs - tutted. "You must care for your friend very much." 

"I do," Croix replied without thinking. She gripped the bannister as soon as the words left her mouth, clenching it until her wrist hurt. 

"Are you alright?" 

"I'm fine," Croix managed, and continued down the steps without another word. She couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief when the stairs ended and the library began. "Do you have any kind of organization system for this stuff, or is it just scattered around?" 

"Of course we have it organized!" The old woman trotted forward, plucking an electric lamp from a table and flicking it on. It wasn't really needed - lights flooded the library from every angle - but Croix supposed it added to the appeal. "We've got everything, from magic to space travel to questionable social experiments on teenagers. You'd be right down that hall, I'll help find your place." 

"That'd be great, Mrs. . . erm . . ." 

"Mrs. M is fine." The floors were dust-free, but the books on the shelves looked untouched. Some looked very old, some looked as if they'd been sent straight from the latest bookstore shipment. "If you care about names, anyway." 

"Right." Croix ran her finger over one of the spines - _Law Enforcement & Skeletons,_ it read - and blew away the dust when it stuck. 

"We don't get a lot of people showing up like you did. Used to, but then it got annoying. I used to be an adventurer like yourself, all full of gritted teeth and swinging fists, but that was a long time ago, and now I'm just happy living with the love of my life. It's why we put the plaque in, to scare people off. It's only the ones looking for something really important who come, nowadays." 

"What's going to happen to it in the future?" A few signs, decorated with cartoon bunnies, pointed out where to go for fairies and robotics. 

"After we're dead, you mean?" Mrs. M laughed. "No idea. I guess we'll let the public have at it. Sis intended for it to double as a nuclear shelter, since it's tough enough to withstand-" she made an exploding motion with her hands _"-pow."_ Croix paled. "Are you alright? You look like you've seen a ghost." 

"I'm fine, thank you. We should keep moving." 

After a few more minutes of Mrs. M's nonsensical babblings, the pair reached a bookshelf that looked like every other. 

"Here we are," she announced, spreading her arms like she'd just found a treasure chest. "You should find something on that curse of yours. Yell if you need anything, I'm going back upstairs. Croix watched her hobble away until she'd all but disappeared, and only then did she start pulling books from their spots, flipping through them for any mention - any at all - of Wagandea's Curse. A slight draft blew through the library, and it ruffled her scarf.

***

"Bring them back anytime you'd like!" the first Mrs. M called out as Croix packed her bags. "We don't have any kinda system for returns, so just make sure you do your best with whatever it is!" 

"Come back soon!" the second Mrs. M added, waving cheerfully. "You always have a home with us!" 

_Dear Chariot,_ Croix began, using one of the hardcover books as backing as she started to write her thoughts. 

_Oh, do I have a story to tell you._

_The hermit was actually two hermits, and they were surprisingly nice. They gave me croquettes and let me borrow more books than I really needed. Someday we should go back there, together. I think they'd like you a lot._

_Thank you for the scarf, by the way - it's nice and warm. You should keep up the knitting, you seem to have a knack for it if this is really your first attempt. I've got enough books and plants to start heading off on the next leg of my journey, now with another suitcase in tow. Levitation spells are a godsend when you're traveling, let me tell you that._

_As for the mailing method, I'll think something up. Wouldn't want to disappoint you, after all. I hope this letter finds you well._

_-Croix_

***

Chariot wasn't sure what to expect when she saw the oily pigeon smack against her window. She hadn't even been the first one to see it - that honor went to Lotte, who'd looked up from her collector's edition copy of the latest _Night Fall_ book to see the bird unevenly flap its wings on a direct route to the clear window. She'd yelled out a warning, but it came too late and the bird started to slide down. 

"Here!" Chariot shoved open the window and snatched the bird by the talon, grateful when it chirped indignantly. _At least it's not dead._ She'd have dismissed it as a city bird gone rogue if not for the letter tied to its leg. "Oh, Croix. You're always one to surprise me, aren't you?" 

"Croix . . ." Lotte mused, setting down her book. _"Professor_ Croix? She's sending you l-love letters?" 

"They're not love letters!" Chariot blurted out, maybe a bit too loudly - the pigeon started squawking, which woke up Alcor, which led him to leer at the other bird to show it who was boss. "We're just . . . conversing, that's all." Lotte didn't seem convinced, and as she adjusted her round glasses, Chariot had a feeling she'd be sitting there for a long time. 

"In _Night Fall,_ book fourteen, Belle is forced to return to her own time to judge a science competition, but she sends Edgar letters through the portal every second she has. He reads every single one and sends his replies on handmade parchment, written with his finest quills!"

"Uh-"

"This plot thread is dropped soon after they're reunited, but it reappears in book one-thirty-eight, when they live in the same timeline but are forced to remain on opposite sides of the world! Belle enchants the letters so that they'll fly like doves right to Edgar's window, and in return he sends his in the form of bats! Isn't that romantic?" 

"Would your first thought really be 'that's romantic' if a swarm of paper bats showed up at your house out of nowhere?" She wasn't willing to tell Lotte that she'd actually tried the very same spell during her school days, but it had been far more tiring than she'd expected and the letter hadn't even made its way to Croix's dorm. She'd blamed Croix herself for that - they read the books together, sometimes, underneath covers when nobody else was looking. 

". . . and then in book two-hundred-ninety, Belle sneaks into Edgar's room and finds out he's kept every single one of her letters in a safeguarded box! Oh, I nearly cried at that part!" 

"Croix and myself aren't like that," Chariot insisted. "We were friends in high school, we're trying to be friends again now, that's all." Lotte was unfazed. 

"That's what Edgar said, right up until book seventy, when he finally confesses his deep, undying love! That scene is quoted as one of the most iconic parts of _Night Fall,_ but it somehow never made it into the movie adaptions. Those were trash, by the way. They got Belle's casting all wrong!" 

"It's just because they don't allow email here." 

"Even when Edgar gained access to a mobile phone in book three-hundred-twenty, he still handwrote everything he thought about Belle to give to her on their thirtieth anniversary!" 

"How long have these books been going on for?" 

"A hundred and twenty years," Lotte replied smugly. As much as the romance talk made her heart pound in fear, Chariot had to admit there was something wonderful about the faraway look Lotte got in her eyes as she broke into her theory on the next book, set to come out in two months. 

"Huh." 

_Dear Croix,_

_I'm glad to hear that the hermits didn't cause you any harm, and I'm glad you liked my scarf. I'll be sending another one with Alcor, hopefully this one won't be as flimsy. Do you know where you're heading next?_

_You wouldn't happen to remember Lotte Yanson, would you? She's sitting in my office as I write this - that delivery robot makes a good chair, I guess - and she's the biggest fan of those_ Night Fall _books I've met._

Chariot laughed a little bit to herself, prompting a "what's funny, Professor?" from Lotte. 

_You kept all of them under your bed, didn't you? I didn't bother you about it, but you could tell I knew and so we both just kind of caved in the end. I couldn't keep track of any of the characters and I really had no idea what any of it was about, but I'd say I made a pretty good Edgar that one Halloween. You were the prettiest Belle I'd ever seen. Also the_ only _Belle I'd ever seen, but you get the idea._

_God, I miss you._

_Best, Chariot._

She rolled up the letter before she even had the chance to read it over, her chest thumping and thumping and her head pounding. Alcor squawked in confusion when she tied the letter to his leg and dug out another scarf from below her desk. 

"Deliver this to Croix, alright?" she whispered, and Alcor nodded sharply before flying out the still-open window. 

"It really is a picturesque love story," Lotte murmured from the corner, too quiet for Chariot to hear her, but loud enough for Alcor, who flapped his wings just a little harder. 

***

Croix missed the hermits. 

She'd progressed on her research by leaps and bounds, notebooks bursting with breakthroughs on every other page, but her travels continued to be as solitary as they always were. It gave her more time to think than she perhaps needed - walking through damp dirt roads did that to you - and during one of these days of travel she came to the rather abrupt, world-stopping realization that she was lonely. 

This bothered her not for the truth of the statement - _obviously_ she was lonely, she'd been traveling on her own for several months now without any sort of companion - but for how it made her feel. Years, _years_ of perfecting her technology on her own and she'd never even thought about her self-imposed solitude, her only companion the machines and a microwaved bowl of ramen. Then, suddenly, here she was, walking through some nondescript little village in the middle of the night under the full moon, and she was _lonely._

Croix's thoughts would've continued along this path for a while longer if it hadn't been for the now-familiar _"ca-caw!"_ that rang across the sky. 

"I'm right here, buddy," she called out half-heartedly. Alcor promptly dive-bombed in front of her, holding another scarf and another letter. "Thanks." Unrolling the letter as Alcor flew away, Croix felt a tug in her chest. 

"Hey! You! You're the one staying at our inn, right?" A man - more like a boy, really, long and limber and standing in front of a crumbling little building - waved to her eagerly. "Miss, erm, Mardi Gras?" 

"Meridies!" Croix yelled back. She'd already committed the letter to memory, and just saying her own name became painful. Close as she was, the cure - and all that went with it - seemed so far away that even the short trek to greet the innkeeper felt like forever. 

***

The first thing that occurred to her when she stepped inside was how unlike a hotel room it was - it looked more lived-in, as if someone had cleaned up and was letting her use their spare bed. Books of fairy tales with tattered spines sat off to the side, a poster of some cartoon superhero peeled at the edges above her, and it all just felt so _nice_ that for a moment Croix forgot about the cure and the longing and believed she was just coming home. 

Then, of course, a jar of preserved pine needles fell out of one of her many bags, and she remembered why she was really here - a strange and remote enough place for her to start really experimenting without much interference. She'd gathered enough information to know _something,_ at least, and that was all she needed to start mixing things together, fiddling with spells and plants and anything else she could get her hands on. 

The door creaked open, and the young man from earlier poked his head inside. 

"We've got some microwaveable dinner in the fridge if you want it," he offered. "Nothing much, just some ramen and that sorta thing, but you look tired." 

"I'm alright, thank you." Digging out her notes and nestling herself under the covers like she was a kid again, Croix got to work. 

_Dear Chariot,_

_Thank you again for the second scarf. I'll be the coziest witch in Europe at this rare!_

_I remember_ Night Fall _well. Everyone_ hated _those books, but I never minded them. They were nice and dumb and . . . distracting, I guess. Regardless of how good or bad the books themselves were, though, we were the best pair at that Halloween party hands down._

_I'm in the middle of nowhere right now. If I didn't know better, I'd say your bird was magic for finding me here, but he_ is, _so . . . there's not much I can say, really._

_I'm close, I think. I really hope I am. The next time I write you, it'll be with the cure._

Her head was spinning while the words wrote themselves of their own volition, and she thought of the heap of junk still sitting in Chariot's office, refusing to leave. She thought of how she'd spent so, so long waiting to cut Chariot away from her life entirely, and how sadly futile that had ended up. 

_I'm coming home, Chariot._

_Love, Croix._

She raised her wand and let the letter reconstruct itself into a little bird, watching as it flapped its paper wings and flitted out the window. 

That night she dreamed of living in a house not unlike this one, curled up in bed with Chariot at her side at the end of each day, watching the seasons change from the warm little room. It wasn't much, but it was enough to bring a smile to her face when she woke up. 

The message had reached its final destination. 

***

Chariot woke up to an incessant flapping against her window, and she feared another carrier pigeon until she realized that it was nothing more than a roll of paper. 

"Always the romantic one, hmm, Croix?" she murmured, letting the bird collapse and unfurl back into the flat letter. Still bleary from sleep, she had to read it over a few times before it sank in, before the _Love, Croix_ embedded itself in her brain and her heart like a dragon threatening to set her very soul on fire, or something equally indescribable and pretentious. For once, nothing came to mind as a response - what could equal what she saw, after all? - and so Chariot set it aside with her heart set aflutter. 

***

Weeks passed. Chariot wrote letter after letter, but each one seemed to fall short of something she'd really send, and she'd end up tossing each one away in frustration. 

"Hey, have you heard anything from Croix-sensei lately?" Akko asked, kicking her legs up on the now-concealed delivery robot. "You two were writing a bunch of letters to each other, weren't you?" 

"We were." Chariot adjusted her glasses, useless as they were - she'd stopped needing them, and had long since popped out the lenses, but she'd become used to the weight of them - and looked down at her latest attempt. "I think I've almost got it, but at the same time, it's . . . it's a careful situation. It's hard to know what to say." 

"Really?" 

"What's surprising about that?" 

"Oh, it's just that, well, when you were Shiny Chariot, you were always so cool and sure of everything! You'd be able to defeat the bad guys with a smile and fill people's hearts with magic!" Akko's body language, just a moment ago full of elaborate gestures, seemed to quiet. "I know it's not the same thing, but you're still really brave." 

"What if it was a slip of the tongue, or she didn't mean it in that way, or she's changed her mind?" Chariot fretted, looking over the letter again. Akko shrugged. 

"She's been out there for months so that she can help _you_ get better! I dunno, that sounds like love to me." Akko flopped back onto the heap and promptly held back a yelp. 

"Are you okay?" 

"Sharp points," Akko winced. "Chariot-sensei, whatever you write is gonna be something great if you really mean it." 

"Thanks, Akko." Chariot turned back to the paper and started to write again. 

_Dear Croix,_

_I hope your research is going well. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to write back to you, it's just that I haven't really had to deal with these feelings since . . . well, since high school, really, and I'd forgotten how confusing they can get._

_I've missed you a lot more than I've probably let on from these letters, and I'm awaiting the day you return with baited breath. Not because of the cure, or some redemption journey, but because I've missed_ you. _I've missed that way your eyes light up when you come up with an idea, I've missed your throaty laugh, I've missed your soft hands and how they always fit so perfectly against mine, I've even missed that stupid cape. I've missed every part of you, and sometimes that's incredibly terrifying, even to someone who's faced the near end of the magic world as we know it._

_I want us to have a future, after all of this, even if I don't know what it is yet. I want us to keep living through new things, together._

_This isn't a vampiric love confession or a present or anything like that. It's just my feelings. It's just that. I really, truly hope this gets through to you._

_Love, Chariot_

Tying the letter with a stray ribbon before she could change her mind, Chariot hurriedly beckoned Alcor over. The bird shook his head. 

"What? _Now_ you refuse to listen to me?" In lieu of an answer, Alcor jutted his head towards the window, giving what must've been the crow equivalent of a smile. 

"What's he staring at?" Akko wondered. Chariot looked out to see a wobbly broom zipping through the clear blue sky, and her eyes widened. 

"I have to go," she breathed, stumbling over her desk, running for the stairwell. Akko sat up in confusion.

"Chariot-sensei?" she called, but Chariot was already rushing downstairs, rushing outside, running to meet the falling broom and the woman in the two scarves who'd taken monopoly of her heart for so long, and it must've looked like the last scene of a romance novel to anyone looking - Chariot, jumping to meet Croix as she sped towards the ground and the two of them crashing together in an embrace. 

"I missed you," Croix whispered, over and over again, breathing into Chariot's hair, staining her robe with warm tears. "I missed you, I missed you, I-"

"I missed you too." Chariot shook in the hug, relief washing over her body, and before she knew it she was crying right along with her. "God, Croix, I missed you so much." Croix stepped back a little later, hands resting on Chariot's shoulders, and looked to her for any signs of refusal, but there was none, and soon their lips met in what fairy tales would've called the end of the story, the true love's kiss and the happily ever after, but to Chariot and Croix it was just the very beginning. 

"You won't believe what I saw," Croix said, once the kiss had ended and the two of them were still holding each other and wishing they never had to let go. "There were so many people I met, and I found something akin to the cure, and-" Chariot kissed her again, and she tasted like the north winds and old books and a thousand other things she couldn't place, but she was still familiar, wonderful Croix, and _oh_ she was in love.

"I have a lot to tell you too," Chariot said, a smile reaching up to her ears, giddy as a schoolgirl. "Shall we head inside?" Croix held her hand, and it was harder, now, more calloused and scarred and far different from how it had been so many years ago, but Chariot was the same, and so they headed back into Luna Nova together, a whole world of futures ready to be written. 

**Author's Note:**

> if you can guess the meaning behind the old ladies' lock combination i'm probably going to fall in love with you


End file.
